Recycling ?

Sort of an ignoble end to a beautiful Christmas tree.  Canby has recycling of yard debris, but the least a person could do would be to cut it up so it takes up less room in the recycle bin and transfer better.

  They are probably the same folks that never flatten their cardboard boxes. 

The In-between Time

    How is your "in-between time" going?  In between Christmas and New Years.   Christmas has been in the forefront of our lives for more than a month. We had a great Christmas with friends on Christmas Eve and with family on Christmas Day.  The decorations have not been taken down yet.  Randa still has at least a half-dozen Holiday movies recorded for future viewing.  Remember when the day after Christmas was a big shopping day?  Doesn't seem to have the emphasis that it used to.
    For us, this is the time to be thinking about our trip south.  What clothes to take. (we will be gone 7 months so we will need clothing for all climates.  What tools, what equipment?  What to include and what to leave at home.  Weight and space are factors.  Every pound we leave here with will be pulled 1500 miles to Kartchner then 500 miles to Pecos then another 1400 miles back to Canby.
     In Arizona we will be 10 miles from Benson and in NM we will be 3 miles from the tiny town of Pecos and 30 miles from Santa Fe so shopping will not be a problem.  We have not spent much time to the Benson area and have never been to northern NM so we plan to do some exploration and shopping will be part of that experience.  Gotta have a new T-shirt or two.
     The other thing that I am doing is watching the weather.  It's always a bit foreboding driving over the mountains to this time of year.  My preferred route is Willamette Pass on Hwy 58, but there are a couple of other choices too.  I really don;t want to drive down I-5 into California and then cross if I don't have to.  I-5 is crowded, lots of hills, and California has a huge gas tax so fuel is expensive.  (about a dollar a gallon higher than it's neighboring states).
     So we move through the in-between time.  Packing we can control.  Weather ....... 

Locksmith

   Had to call the locksmith.  Needed to have a key made.  The one and only key to the shed, which was on a fob in my watch pocket, became airborne in the bathroom while I was pulling up my pants and flushing the toilet at the same time and.....
   Anyway, he came by got the door open in 3 minutes, made 2 keys and was gone 15 minutes and $80 later.  I did learn a couple of life lessons.  Have more than one key for any lock.  Don't put your keys in your watch pocket.  Don't try to do two things in the at the same time in the bathroom. 

Preparation

Yesterday afternoon the rain subsided.  Stopped actually.  So it gave me time to do some outside tasks.  I played with my truck.  😀  I swept out the box.  Wiped down the inner walls.  Loaded a few tools.  I even decided to wipe off the differential cover.  (If had been warmer, I might have painted it.) 

    As I was under there, I noticed the spare tire hanging above me.  I had forgotten about it !  I wonder when the last time the air pressure had been checked. Getting the spare down is an interesting task.  I removed the jack which from its position on top of the radiator.  It had been awhile since I had removed the spare so I looked at my owners manual in the glove box.  Sure enough I had forgotten the special tool that attaches to the end of the jack.  It is then inserted into the cone next to the rear license plate.

You can see the jack handle sticking out of the hole next to the license plate.  By turning the "crank" lowers the spare allowing access.  I pulled it out enough to check the air pressure.  40psi.     Not good.  Several minutes on the compressor got it up to 60+ psi.  Then reversing the cranking put it back underneath the box until needed.

Morning Walk

   It was a dark and rainy morning.  (Sounds like the beginning of a Edgar Allan Poe story).  It was almost 7am but still no sign of daylight.  ( today is the shortest day/longest night of the year)  I look forward to increasing light.  I would have preferred to sleep another hour, but the boys get restless.  Hunter comes around to my side of the bed to get a head rub each morning and today was no exception.  So, it was get up in the dark and dress in the dark.  Then wander out into the family room in the dark. The boys wander behind me knowing what comes next.  We go out into the garage so that I get my into my various jackets and today, a rain parka.  Hunter also has a rain "parka" to help keep him less wet.
   And so we walked.  Our morning walk is usually longer, but the wet conditions encouraged me to shorten it.  The boys know that breakfast follows the walk, so they would not complain about heading home early.

More cookies

Peanut Butter Blossoms for you.

Cookies !!!

What would Christmas be without cookies?  Decorated cookies.  On Saturday Randa and I had help from Ellie and Sofia and together we produced some artistic marvels ! ? !  See for yourself.

The Tree

I forgot to show you the tree dressed.  It definitely looks the best in the dark.

The Band

   Gus Dewey’s band is in town !  I wonder if they are still called the Jestures.  They are going to play.  In fact it is this afternoon.  I didn’t think he still played.  I didn’t think he was still alive.   And they are going to play here!  Wow.  I am definitely going to be around to enjoy the music and also can reacquaint myself with Gus.  It’s been a long time.  North Mankato.  50’s and 60’s .

   Gus was always cool.  He wasn’t a jock.  He wasn’t a brain or a nerd.  He played music. He had a band.  He was cool.   I was not.  So if you were not cool, you hung around Gus and tried to be. Teachers called him Daniel.  Everybody else called him, Gus.  He played music.   That’s what he did.  It was enough.

    So today is going to be a trip down memory lane.  A trip back to the days of my youth growing up in North Mankato, Minnesota.  So I hung around the place where Gus was going to play.  It was an outdoor area, a parking lot.  At one end was a small covered area that could be used as a food counter for a burger vendor.  In fact there were several stools in front of the counter.  That was going to be the stage for the performance.

  As time got closer, I got more excited and wandered over to the “stage” to see if the band was ready.  They were just about to begin.  I thought about sitting on one of the stools so that I would have a good seat, then remembered that rock and roll music is best when it’s loud, so I moved away.  I was so concentrating on the counter and stools that I never actually saw any of the band members clearly.  They were there but were just outlines and shadows.

   I awoke before the music started.   I bet it was awesome.

Getting the Tree

  For the first time in since we moved up to Canby, we now have a Christmas tree.  Not an artificial one.  A Real tree.  Grand Fir.  6 foot. ( Not nearly as big as Randa wanted.)

There were many to choose from so it took some time to find the right one.

Here it is in the living room waiting to be decorated.  Stay tuned.

  We drove out about 15 miles south east of Molalla to a tree farm in the foothills and cut our own.  Just like old times.  It was great fun. 

Ice Crystals

Ice crystals in the dirt.